


Standing Still, Finally At Peace

by respoftw



Series: Tumblr Prompts - Hawksilver edition [68]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Brainwashing, M/M, Pre-Slash, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-20 14:02:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4789943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/respoftw/pseuds/respoftw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt - it's not Wanda that brings back Pietro; it's Hydra. They rob the grave to get as much detail about the only successfully experiments, and figure out a way to bring him back to life. And when the Avengers take out THIS Hydra base, they find a Pietro who's been through the memory wipe machine, and follows hydra's orders, and it's seeing Clint that knocks him out of it. Because they didn't think to destroy Clint as thoroughly as they erased Wanda</p>
            </blockquote>





	Standing Still, Finally At Peace

It had taken a lot of courage, both real and of the liquid variety, for Clint to visit Pietro's grave. It had taken a long time for Clint to build up that courage, so by the time he walked through the gates of the small, peaceful graveyard in the Sokovian countryside, months had passed. Months of drinking himself into oblivion, months of pushing everyone else away, months of guilt, months of pain and months of bitterness at the things left unsaid, at the actions left untaken.

 

As he picked his way across the frost covered ground, Clint's sorrow weighed him down until every step felt like lead. Still, this was something he had to do, something he needed to do, to move on with his life, to stop hiding away from the rest of the world. He needed to say goodbye to Pietro, to all the things that could have been.

 

The tombstone was small, simple, Pietro's name carved deeply into it with the dates that were far too close together underneath. Clint ran his fingers across the dates. _Kid was far too young_ , he thought, too young to die, too young for an old man like him, too young for it all. He hadn't attended the funeral, had spent almost no time at all with the Avengers since the whole mess, so the epitaph came as a surprise.

 

_Standing Still, Finally At Peace._

 

It seemed fitting to Clint as he remembered the crazy, burning energy that used to surround the kid. An energy that seemed to burn like a bright flame, pretty to look at but with the potential for destruction. The knowledge that Pietro was free from that burden was little comfort but, these days, little comfort was better than none.

 

He hadn't brought anything with him to the grave, wouldn't have known what to bring, it's not like they ever got around to talking about favourite flowers, but as he looked at the bare ground, not even grass growing to cover the site, he wished he had brought something, even it was stupid, something to take away from the cold, barren look of freshly tilled earth, something bright and blue and alive, something - -

 

Clint tenses violently, suddenly on guard, as the strangeness of the grave finally clicks into place. This grave looks fresh, like it had been filled much more recently than it should have been. As the conclusions start forming in Clint's mind he stumbles away from the grave, stomach churning in horror as he empties up the last of his Dutch courage into a nearby bush.

 

Someone had dug up Pietro's body.

 

*

 

Clint had wanted to be wrong, more desperately than he had ever wanted anything in his life, but a phone call to Natasha later he had watched with red-rimmed eyes as the local authorities had exhumed the coffin...the empty coffin.

 

*

 

It's been eight months since they discovered Pietro's empty grave, the anniversary of his death fast approaching and Clint _still_ can't sleep. At least the drinking has stopped, although the only reason for that was that it was impossible to mount an effective search while three sheets to the wind. Each night, each day that ends with them no closer to finding out what was done with Pietro's body, is harder and harder to bear but Clint will never give up. He owes Pietro that much.

 

_Standing Still, Finally At Peace._

 

The epitaph seems like a joke now, HYDRA's final slap in the face to the Maximoff's; taking even that small comfort away from them.

 

They know that HYDRA must be responsible, it's the only thing that makes sense, but no matter how many bases they uncover, no matter how many projects they put down, they can find no evidence.

 

Clint lies awake at night thinking of Pietro's body being cut up and studied and mutilated, all in the name of creating more weapons and the desire to crawl back into a bottle is getting stronger each night. Only Wanda stops him from doing so. Wanda has stayed in this search, long after the others had given up and her gentle assertion that she had nothing to forgive Clint for in the first place when he had fallen to his knees and apologised to her, is all that keeps him going sometimes.

 

Wanda is so much more powerful than HYDRA could have ever imagined. Together, they'll make them pay for what they did to Pietro. Eventually.

 

*

 

Clint bristles at being pulled into one of the routine Avengers briefings, he still refuses to join in on any non-Pietro related missions but Steve never gives up on him. _Not like he's given up on Pietro_ , Clint thinks, unkindly.

 

He sits in the corner, separating himself from the rest of the team as usual and fully intends to spend the entire meeting lost in his own thoughts, fidgeting with his pen, until Bucky's words burst through the barricades in his mind.

 

“ - - they're calling him 'The Ghost Soldier'. He's fast, he's lethal, he's dangerous. Just the thought that they're doing what they did to me to someone else is - - “

 

“How fast?” Clint interrupts, drawing all eyes in the room to him. “Inhumanly fast?”

 

The other Avengers exchange worried looks at Clint's insinuations and Steve shifts uncomfortably in his seat. “Pietro's dead, Clint. He was in the ground for eight weeks before HYDRA took him. There's no coming back from that... You know that, right?”

 

“We don't know anything. Not for sure.” Clint continues, voice growing louder and more manic as he talks over the others who are trying to reason with him. “We don't know the full extent of Pietro's powers. Hell, Wanda's been with you for a year and you've barely even scratched the surface of what she can do. Pietro's body goes missing and a few months later there's a new Winter Soldier on the loose? That can't be a coincidence.” Looking around desperately, Clint sets his eyes on Bucky. “Bucky, you know this process. How long would you say it would take for HYDRA to break someone, to wipe them as thoroughly as they wiped you?”

 

Steve is standing now, ready to shut Clint down properly for daring to bring up the horrors that Bucky had been subjected to but Bucky's quiet, thoughtful voice stills him.

 

“Seven or eight months to do it right that first time.”

 

They all fall silent as they think about it. Pietro's body has been missing for eight months. They've seen weirder things than this...right?

 

“I want on this mission, Cap.” Clint is defiant as he raises his chin and looks Steve in the eyes. He can see the moment when Steve's resolve breaks.

 

“Suit up. We leave in thirty.”

 

*

 

Clint may have sounded confident during the meeting but he didn't really believe that Pietro was alive, not deep down, not until he saw the flash of white hair, not until he saw the blur of an armour-clad body speeding past them.

 

It was simultaneously the best and worst realisation in the world. Pietro was alive, he was breathing and moving and wonderfully whole, but he wasn't Pietro. He was The Ghost Soldier and Clint had spent enough time with Bucky to know just how terrible the things that had been done to him to get him there would have been.

 

Was he a horrible person to still be relieved that Pietro was alive? Was it better to be dead and at peace than alive and taken over? While under the influence of Loki, Clint would have preferred death to being forced out of his own mind, forced to kill. What did it say about him that he couldn't even contemplate making the same choice when it came to Pietro?

 

As Pietro advanced on him, as Clint lowered his bow, unable to take the shot, ignoring the shouts and cries of the others, he no longer cared what it said about him, he was just too full of happiness to see Pietro alive, even if it was the last thing he would ever see.

 

“I never saw this coming.” Clint laughed, a sad sound. “Surprising me to the end.” Pietro's eyes, so cold and distant and full of rage a second ago, flickered in confusion as Clint smiled.

 

“O-old man?”

 

Clint's laugh turned joyful, even as the blood bubbled out of his mouth, the knife that Pietro had slid into his belly shining with red. “I'm unforgettable, huh?”

 

Pietro's frantic cries were the last thing Clint heard as the darkness caved in.

 

*

 

Waking up was always the hardest part of Clint's day. Those few seconds, before reality set in, were the cruellest moments to deal with.

 

As Clint blinked awake, the feel of a warm, rough, hand in his own was almost too much to bear. It was always hard when his dreams bled through into waking, even if just for a second.

 

“Sshh, you're fine. Go back to sleep. You lost too much blood. Rest. I'm not going anywhere.” Pietro's voice sounded strained and broken and tired and more wonderful than any dream that Clint could ever imagine. He had saved him. Pietro was here with him. Standing still, finally at peace.

 

Clint drifted off with a smile on his face.

 

Everything was going to be OK.

 

 


End file.
